Turn change into gold

Surrender or Control?

Knowing how difficult it is for many of us to make significant changes, I have enormous admiration for the easeful way in which other forms of life surrender to changes in their external world. Recently, on a retreat at Solitude, in the Midlands, I watched an autumn leaf falling to the ground . And I thought about how easily she submitted to a process which would be part of the degeneration and later, re-generation of life. As humans, we want to hold on so tightly to what we have or who we think we are, that we are often not open to the new life that can come from surrender.

I wrote this poem in honour of that leaf which has reminded me of my need to surrender certain attitudes and ways of being in order to reach new levels of depth and meaning. It also reminded me that in relationships I have the choice between power and release. If having the power is all important to me, and I do not relinquish that need to be right and to be in control, then I impoverish myself and the relationship.